Don found him, curled up like a child, hands over his head. For a second Don thought someone had been caught in one of the traps. He slithered and eased his way closer, and then he realised it was Steve. Steve huddled in wretched mute hysteria, his eyes wide, staring into oblivion. Don gently eased him to sit up, but Steve seemed afraid of him, and not until he had wrapped him in his arms repeating that it was all right, that he was safe, did Don feel the rigid tension released. But Steve's hands were still like a vice, holding on to Don, and Don sat with him, rocking him, talking to him. Don, who was too shy to talk to anyone, understood, had no need for words, because he had been in that darkness, he had been in that mute land of fear.
Steve tried, once, twice, and then burped out, 'Poachers – two kids.' Don gave a pat to Steve. 'Good lad, I'll go tip off the lads… they're up in the hide, can you make it there?'
Steve nodded, watching Don move like the clappers, bent low, zig-zagging out of the way of the flares, heading back to the camp. Steve was alone again, listening to his own heartbeat slowly returning to normal, unlike the rest of him, that would never come back.
CHAPTER 17
Kids, that's all they were, one of them barely fifteen, caught out there on open moorland which a moment ago had been inky black, now lit up to the horizon with the brightness of a film set.
Even while the shock of it was still registering, their young faces frozen with panic, Harry and Cliff broke from cover, running swiftly and silently down the slope, and were upon them from behind. It was nasty, quick, brutally efficient. Grabbed by their collars, kneed in the back of the legs, stamped into a prone position, faces pushed into the ground, arms twisted behind their backs. Handcuffs slapped on, sacks rammed over their heads, muffling their terrified screams.
Worse was to come, and it came in the shape of Malone, crashing through the bracken, red-faced, veins bulging in his neck. Pumped up like a mad bull, he charged forward and took a vicious, swinging kick at one of the hooded shapes, swung round and booted the other with all his sixteen-and-a-half stone behind it.
'Hey! That's enough, Malone. Back off!'
Dillon ran up as the two boys rolled and squirmed in agony, shrieking and slobbering in pain. 'Cliff, get the bag off the kid's head,' Dillon ordered. And stepped in front of Malone as he was about to land another brutal kick, shoving him in the chest.
Glowering at Dillon, Malone snarled. 'You don't like it? You got somethin' to say about it…?' He extended his hand, fingers curled, gently beckoning. 'Come on then, come on, Dillon, let's have you!'
Dillon didn't move, didn't speak.
Slowly, deliberately, Malone unzipped his quilted jacket and tossed it down, flexing huge shoulders, hairy tattooed arms and hard biceps straining the sleeves of a black T-shirt. He beckoned again, smiling.
'Don't, Frank!' Cliff spoke quietly in Dillon's ear. 'He's a madman, he'll kill you… back off him.'
'Don't tell me,' Dillon said in a tone like cold steel, 'what to do.' Turning away, he cupped his hand under the blood-smeared frightened face of one of the boys. 'You okay, son?'
Dillon ruffled the boy's hair, then stooped to pick up Malone's jacket, was about to throw it to him when Malone flicked out a left jab, catching Dillon off-balance. Clutching the jacket in two bunched fists, Dillon took a threatening pace forward.
'Frank – don't,' Harry said, shaking his head.
Cliff stepped in, snatched the jacket from Dillon and handed it to Malone. For perhaps five seconds nobody moved. Everybody waiting to see if Dillon, seething with rage, was going to take Malone on. Nobody else wanted to, but was Dillon the man to do it? Did he have the bottle? The fifteen-year-old kid was whimpering, and as Dillon went to him, wiping blood from the boy's nose, Malone laughed. A loud, derisive laugh from the belly. And, shrugging into his quilted jacket, started to make soft little clucking chicken noises, black eyes glinting with triumphant bravado.
Turning his back on Malone, as if he hadn't heard, Dillon said stonily, 'We got a job to do, all right? Now, let's get on with it!'
But he had heard right enough, and everybody knew it.
Little Phil's hacking cough had awakened her, and as Susie hurried through in her bare feet, Kenny was at it too. She didn't turn on the light, didn't want to wake them. A chink in the curtains let in an orange glow from the corner streetlamp, giving a sepia tint to the glossy photographs pinned to the walls. Dillon and the lads, kitted up in jumping gear, boarding a Hercules, thumbs-up to the camera. A couple of the less gory shots from the Falklands. Two photos of the platoon in smart No. 2 dress-parade uniforms, collars and ties – sunlight flaring off their cap badges, taken on the square at The Depot. A large blowup in full colour of a sky filled with blossoming white and yellow parachutes – NATO manoeuvres in Germany. And postcards and mementoes from all over the world, every continent Dad had served in, plus bits and pieces of Para equipment: webbing, HALO goggles, tropical-issue water bottle, Parachute Regiment shoulder flash, the quick-release box off a PX1 harness, camouflage pattern forage cap, empty magazine clip. To the boys a hallowed shrine, material proof that Dad had been one of the famous 'Red Devils' – the meanest, toughest, fittest bunch going.
In the lower bunk, duvet kicked off, Phil was burning up, twisting and coughing in his sleep. Susie felt his forehead and the backs of her fingers came away sticky. Anxious now, she checked on Kenny in the top berth, pyjamas soaked with sweat, breath rasping. Both boys were really sick, no doubt about it.
The door was pushed open and Susie's mother peered in, hairnet over bulging curlers like an alien's headgear.
'It's mumps!' Susie whispered, distraught. 'Look at their throats…'
Don Walker found the tell-tale signs at first light, and shouted Dillon over to have a look. The two village kids had been taken into police custody, and now it was back to the more serious business – the business they were being paid for – protecting the salmon tanks. It was at the northern end of the compound, sixty yards or so from the fence, where the lane branched off into a rough moorland track. Thick hedgerows of thorn and thistles stretched away, clumps of juniper bushes dotted about.
Squatting on his haunches, Don pointed out the tracks to Dillon and Cliff. 'They've been here all right – look, tyre treads, five fag ends. There was two of 'em, and it wasn't the kids, they came in a van.' He prodded the soft churned earth with his finger and looked meaningfully at Dillon. 'These are scrambler bike tracks.'
Dillon walked a little way up the lane, surveying the general area, and came back. 'Cliff, you and Don start cutting this hedge back, it's too good a hiding place…'
'What about Steve?' Cliff interrupted, dark face a bit haggard from lack of sleep. 'He's always pissed, Frank, we want him off our backs.' He jabbed his thumb into his chest. 'We're doin' all the work!'
Dillon nodded wearily. 'I'll talk to him.'
'Hey! Frank!'
'Kick the waster out – why should we split our dough!' Cliff grumbled.
Dillon made an impatient swipe to shut him up as Jimmy drove up in the jeep, slammed on the brakes and skidded to a stop. Christ, Dillon thought, somebody else with a grouse. Jimmy leapt out, eyes blazing.
'I just caught that bastard Malone red-handed! All that gear I got, the sod's been paid more'n five hundred quid. And two hundred for the radio!' Jimmy leaned nearer, fist up, voice getting throaty. 'I tell you, Frank – you don't take him, when the lads hear about this, you'll have to fight 'em off.'